Intellectual property has become an increasingly valuable asset in today's business. The integration of the intellectual property portfolio - patents, trademarks, copyright and trade secrets - with sound marketing and financial strategies protects the company's ideas, technology and market position and ensures a strong business future. Developing and protecting your intellectual property provides a major competitive advantage. Being aware of the intellectual property rights of others can protect yourself or your company from substantial financial exposure and facilitate designing around or licensing the desired technology. Having a firm behind you with almost 50 years of experience focused in this specialty is a competitive advantage.
An alliance between intellectual property counsel and an individual or a company's business and financial managers will ensure sound management and administration of the Applicant's intellectual property portfolio and will maximize the value of the Applicant's intellectual property assets in the marketplace. Working with competent counsel provides a company or even an independent Applicant with the expertise required to develop a strategy for the prosecution of available or developing intellectual property rights. Such a strategy including advice on the following examples:
· The establishment and protection of proprietary rights of the Company in new products and processes conceived and developed by its employees. It is important that the company obtain patents, when warranted, protect its investment in new product or process developments, and prevent others from obtaining a dominant patent position in technology the company may use or wish to use;
- Avoidance of infringement of a valid patent or other intellectual property rights of others;
- Agreements involving intellectual property to generate income or to gain access to technology through licensing;
- Employee obligations relating to intellectual property so that all employees who may in the course of their employment have access to or generate proprietary information shall, as a condition of employment or continued employment, sign an Invention Assignment and Confidentiality Agreement which includes certain obligations regarding disclosure to the company and ownership of inventions and ideas and the safeguarding of company information;
- The terms and conditions for considering ideas and disclosures of new product ideas and other information, solicited and unsolicited, submitted to the company by non-employees;
- Protection of the company's confidential information and trade secrets which may not be patentable or which may be best protected without patents; and
- Coordination of product research and development with strategic marketing functions including trademark and trade dress selection, clearance and protection.
Once the fundamental procedures for the development and protection of a company or individual's intellectual property have been implemented, it is important to manage and exploit these assets. This requires identification of the Applicant's goals in the national and global marketplace and the protection desired to enable the company to reach those goals. An Applicant needs to determine the value of the technology to its business in each country and assess the risk of not securing protection of a particular invention or trademark in a given country. The selection of countries in which to file, prosecute and maintain coverage in calls for a combination of good business sense and international patent and trademark expertise. The practitioners at Hayes Soloway are here to provide that expertise.
Hayes Soloway can also coordinate and manage an Applicant's intellectual property program. By integrating the administration of an Applicant's intellectual property development and management with our firm's expertise, an Applicant can devote its time and money to the creation of new ideas and technology and the pursuit of its business goals. In this way, the value of the intellectual property portfolio to an Applicant will be increased while reducing legal costs.
The best way for you to learn how to develop and manage your intellectual property is to contact us.
